Mary Agnes Brown Groover – Lieutenant Colonel, United States Army

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From a contemporary press report:

Mary-Agnes Brown Groover, 96, a Veterans Administration lawyer who headed the Women’s Army Corps in the South Pacific during World War II and retired in 1952 from the Board of Veterans Appeals, died of a stroke July 22, 1998 at Ingleside at Rock Creek, the former Presbyterian Home.

Mrs. Groover, a Washington native, was a graduate of Central High School and George Washington University, where she also received two law degrees.
She served as a lieutenant colonel during World War II and was a staff director for Army General Douglas MacArthur. She was awarded a Legion of Merit, and her papers from that period were donated to Radcliffe College

Mrs. Groover started with a predecessor agency of the VA as a clerk in 1919. She later was executive secretary to the medical director, a lawyer in the legal department, chief of the legislative projects division and an adviser on women’s affairs. She edited two congressional volumes of laws affecting veterans. She retired from the appeals board in 1959.

Mrs. Groover was president of the D.C. Women’s Bar Association and the residents association at Ingleside, a trustee of Union Theological Seminary and chair of the international relations committee of the National Federation of Business and Professional Women’s Clubs

She was a member of the D.C. and federal bar associations, National Association of Women Lawyers, American Society of International Law and American Judicature Society.
She also belonged to the National Federation of Federal Employees, English-Speaking Union, American Association of University Women, Bethesda Presbyterian Church, Society of Mayflower Descendants, Society of Descendants of the Colonial Clergy, Women’s National Democratic Club, Phi Delta Delta legal society, Sigma Kappa social sorority, Order of the Eastern Star and Washington Club.

She received distinguished alumni awards from Central High School and George Washington University and was named Woman of the Year in 1946 by the D.C. Soroptimist Club.
Her husband, Dr. Gordon L. Groover, a fellow member of the appeals board, died in 1975.

Survivors include two stepdaughters, Georgia Grunewald of Frederick, Md., and Dorothy Schutrumpf of Richmond; and nine grandchildren.

GROOVER, MARY-AGNES BROWN

On Wednesday, July 22, 1998, MARY-AGNES BROWN GROOVER, wife of the late Dr. Gordon L. Groover; stepmother of Georgia Grunewald and Dorothy Schutrumpf; nine step grandchildren also survive. Services will be held at the Presbyterian Home Chapel, 3050 Military Rd., NW on Tuesday, July 28 at 1 p.m. Interment Arlington National Cemetery. In lieu of flowers, contributions may be made to a charity of your choice.

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